


Warp & Weft

by hes5thlazarus



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Domestic, Established Relationship, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 14:08:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29279742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hes5thlazarus/pseuds/hes5thlazarus
Summary: Anders wakes Fenris up in the middle of the night talking, and then not wanting to talk, about weaving. What they remember and what they have forgot climb into the bed with them.
Relationships: Anders/Fenris (Dragon Age)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 37





	Warp & Weft

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tatertwitch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tatertwitch/gifts).



“Scheißkopf!”   
  
Fenris wakes up to a clatter and a curse in a language he does not understand. He opens a single eye and watches dimly as a hunched shape gropes about on the floor, then brandishes a piece of wood triumphantly. He opens his other eye and squints: Anders is holding a shuttle. He turns, apologetic.   
  
“Did I wake you?” he asks. “I couldn’t sleep.”   
  
“Clearly,” Fenris says sourly. “Come to bed. We’re facing a high dragon tomorrow. We need to sleep.” Anders sits down on the edge of the bed and Fenris pulls him down. “Sleep.” Anders rolls onto his side, facing away, and Fenris sighs. He is upset. He is still playing with the shuttle. “Are you alright?”   
  
“When am I ever.”   
  
Fenris makes a face. “Fair point.” He inches closer to him and throws his arm over his waist. Anders’ back is stiff and knotted. Fenris rests his face against his shoulder and waits.   
  
Finally, Anders says, “Have you ever seen weaving from the Anderfels? Like a quilt, or a shawl?”   
  
Fenris lays quiet against the quiet heat of Anders’ back and cautiously drifts into memory. The lyrium has loosened its grip on what was, now that he has met his sister; still, what Leto knows disturbs when Fenris remembers. He remembers unloading carts in Seheron, packs of bound textiles, and the odd musty smell of carpets carried from the desert: but those were Dalish, from the Wastes, not Ander. He says, “No.”   
  
Anders curls into himself, inching away from Fenris, and Fenris follows, threading his leg between his. They both like to avoid the past; sometimes Fenris needs to tug him through. He traces letters into his back, the title of a new name: F, he writes onto Anders’ spine, then E, then N.   
  
Anders says, “What are you doing?”   
  
“Writing my name on your skin.”   
  
“Oh,” Anders says. “That’s quite nice. Keep doing it.” Fenris rolls his eyes. He’s prickly today. He finishes: R, I, and S with a flourish and the edge of his nail. Anders shivers and arches into him, and normally Fenris would take the invitation to linger and bite down his neck, but he is clearly avoiding something, so Fenris succumbs to the temptation of rubbing against his ass but goes no further, and chases down the subject.   
  
“You were talking about weaving,” Fenris says huskily. He blinks and clears his throat. “From the Anderfels.”   
  
Anders makes a frustrated noise. “I stopped talking,” he says. “You always complain I talk too much. Fuck me instead.” He turns over and looks at him pleadingly, pulling him on top of him. He takes his hand and Fenris laughs as Anders tries to place it on his cock. He pulls away and straddles him instead. Anders bites his lip and Fenris sees him naked, fear and shame vying with lust, so he kisses him, more softly than Anders wanted.   
  
“Try harder, mage,” Fenris says. “When I fuck you I like it when you’re  _ there _ . Rather than using me to not think about something else.”   
  
“And here I thought I was being subtle,” Anders says. “Does it make it worse if I tell you I’m trying not to think of my mother?” Fenris sits back down onto his waist so quickly that Anders barks a laugh. They untangle and tangle again: Fenris stretches onto his side and Anders faces him. Anders scans his face urgently, eyes bright, and then smiles softly. He says, “If it weren’t for Justice I’d think a pride or desire demon were trying to tempt me. Having you here.” Fenris, discomfited, looks away, but when Anders brushes his fingers against his cheek and traces his lips gently, he presses a kiss to his fingertips.   
  
“So,” Fenris says. “Your mother. Weaving. And the Anderfels.”   
  
Anders’ face darkens. “Yes.” He gropes for the nightstand and, triumphant, brandishes the shuttle he had dropped. “My mother was a weaver,” he says conversationally. “My father too, but she had more of an eye for detail than he did. She wove the cover for the pillow she made me. They let me take that with me, when they took me from her. I was thinking of trying again. What she showed me. What I can remember of it.”   
  
Fenris thinks that he had clearly been mulling over it for longer than just this night, because he had never seen a loom in the clinic before. Envy stabs at him, and he shakes his hair into his eyes. He can remember his mother showing Leto, showing Fenris, showing himself how to open a pomegranate. What else? The heat, drinking the soursweet juice running down his chin, wiping his hands to stain his trousers. They hit him for that--why? He closes his eyes and leans into it, remembering his mother mixing a salve.   
  
“Watch. Elfroot as a restorative, embrium to numb the pain.” She smiles at him, encouragingly, and taps the residue off the pestle. “Though not too much embrium. Or elfroot, for that matter.”   
  
What language? He opens his eyes and sees Anders staring fixedly at him, rigidly watching and carefully distant. They have learned the unpleasant way that he lashes out when shaken out of those memories. Fenris is tired, feeling suddenly empty, as if he were a washcloth, rung out to soak up a fever--and that reminds him of something, he does not want to know what.   
  
Anders looks at him askance. “Are you alright?”   
  
Fenris laughs shortly. “When am I ever?” He smooths the worry from his face, brushing his knuckles against worry-lines at the edges of Anders’ mouth. “Are you?”   
  
Anders kisses his hand. They are tender tonight, they are tender most nights: loving him is raw, with what they have both forgotten, with what they have both left. “No.”   
  
They lie together amongst the memories, piled up on the bed like pillows. There are many things Fenris wants to ask: why did he decide to search for a shuttle  _ now _ , where did he acquire the shuttle, what prompted him? What does weaving from the Anderfels look like? What did his mother say, when he was taken, when she pressed the pillow into his hands? What name did she call him by? But that is not fair, because Fenris would not give him Leto, though sometimes he thinks about the boy before the lyrium, when he can stand it. He reaches for Anders, threading his hands through his hair.   
  
Anders says, “I would have been a weaver, if they left me. I was good at it. For a child. But I barely remember how to warp a loom.”   
  
Fenris says, frowning, “My mother labored for the apothecary, I think. But we did not pick our work.”   
  
Anders says, “No. I suppose I didn’t, either.”


End file.
